Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be really disappointed with this present

366 replies

ToMeetOrNotToMeet · 18/12/2021 14:47

I might sound like an ungrateful twat...

The gift is from my boyfriend (on/off - "on a break" at the moment, but he wants to get back together... and I wish we could as well... which is why I'm upset about this. We're just not the same.

We're at his mother's to celebrate my and her birthday. She puts on a big show, champagne, cake etc. There are six of us. We do gifts at the end. We're in a rented holiday cottage.
We swapped gifts. All very nice: ornaments, plants, choccies, jewelry, wine...

Then boyfriend pulls out a bag of apples and another bag of tomatoes and a piece of bamboo. He tells us to close our eyes and imagine being somewhere where these things are grown and being in a hotel and looking out of the window and it's raining.

Then there are three wrapped boxes. One for me. One for his mother. One for my daughter (aged 4) or his brother (aged 30). He still hasn't clarified. He says it doesn't matter who opens what, but if we get the wrong box, we won't like it.

It's three external hard drives.

We don't know whose is whose. We have no way of checking here.

He collects DVDs and Bluerays. He's obviously put a load of films on these hard drives.

I've told him in the past that I don't care about DVDs (his entire house is full of them - I mean so FULL that I can't visit. Hoarder full.). I have about 30 minutes a night to watch TV and I'm happy with Prime and Netflix).

So now, I've got to go home with a hard drive full of films that might be for his mother. She'll go home with one that could be meant for me or my kid.

I know he's probably spent time doing it (a lot of time) but I've already told him many many times that I have enough with what I have. I'm just not interested in all these fucking films.

And what the fuck are the fruit and vegetables all about?

Everything always has to be weird and cryptic and about him. If he'd asked me I'd have liked an Etsy voucher or a sodding candle.

Now he's really upset that nobody cares about his hard drives. But he hasn't even said what's on any of them.

It's mad. He's not talking to me for being so ungrateful and I just feel upset that he's given me something so weird.

AIBU?

OP posts:
UserBot314 · 18/12/2021 14:49

Yes that's weird. He knnows who HE is, but does he know who you are?

Is he so busy being himself in quite an intense way that the other people around him are all interchangeable, literally, to the point where he colludes in them possibly taking home a present that was for somebody else?

Saucery · 18/12/2021 14:49

This would drive me mad, I hate cryptic puzzle presents.

dudsville · 18/12/2021 14:50

And what the fuck are the fruit and vegetables all about?

This made me laugh. It's odd, some moments in life are odd, but I'd also have been disappointed, to be fair I usually am disappointed in gifts though!

Teacupsandtoast · 18/12/2021 14:51

You really want to get back together with him?

Don't. And put the hard drive in the bin

OneRuleForThem · 18/12/2021 14:51

Yes, I think you are actually, and his mother. You yourself have said that you have no idea what is on these hard drives. And it’s not really THAT big of a deal if you discover it’s the wrong one and needs swapping.

Waspsarearseholes · 18/12/2021 14:51

What a bizarre thing to do! Why not label the hard drives so that you at least got the one meant for you? I can't make any sense of this at all. The apples and tomato thing is weird, too. I'm sure in his head it'd have gone down much better than it has in reality, but what on earth was he thinking?! YANBU at all.

Biscuitandacuppa · 18/12/2021 14:52

He sounds like he is far too much hard work and far more interested in himself than you. Let him go and enjoy some time with your dd.

Salayes · 18/12/2021 14:52

This is all very weird. Especially if he didn’t distinguish which hard drive was meant for which person - my guess is they are all identical. Don’t eat the closing eyes bit with the fruit either, what’s that got to do with movies or other digital things you can store on a hard drive?

bonfireheart · 18/12/2021 14:52

Why didn't he just label them? And also the faff of external hard drives when streaming exists... and what was with the tomatoes?! So many questions!!

2reefsin30knots · 18/12/2021 14:53

Why do you want to get back with him?

1FootInTheRave · 18/12/2021 14:53

This is very very odd.

RightOnTheEdge · 18/12/2021 14:54

No YANBU or ungrateful. That sounds very weird and annoying.
Don't get back with him OP. You couldn't ever live with him if his hoarding is so bad and he sounds like a pain.
Move on.
You should have just left the hard drive and vegetables at the house when you went home.

bonfireheart · 18/12/2021 14:54

And how can one of the drives be for a 4 year old girl AND a 30 year old man?

MatildaTheCat · 18/12/2021 14:54

That is one of the oddest things I’ve ever read on here and that, frankly, is quite the statement.

One question: why the fuck do you want to get back together?????

bonfireheart · 18/12/2021 14:55

Please please please before you break up with him, can we all work out an equally bizarre present ritual for you to give him?

SarahBellam · 18/12/2021 14:55

Has he heard of Netflix where people can choose what they want to watch from a massive library? This hard drive shit is like a crap version of a mix tape.

SameToo · 18/12/2021 14:56

Sounds like he’s trying to be cryptic but is shite at it.

That I’m itself would annoy me.

Bluntness100 · 18/12/2021 14:56

Surprised his hoarding movies doesn’t give you the ick never mind this little display with the tomatoes. 🤣

UserBot314 · 18/12/2021 14:56

Guessing here, but he must have felt quite buoyed up by creating the collections, and he believes that you OUGHT to be able to 'tap in' to that buoyancy of his and just knowing somehow which was the right one.

Confused and because you couldn't do that doh you have let him down! You failed to tap in to his magic.

What about your own magic? Would he even notice that?

Maybe I'm being hard on him, but I wouldn't be pushing water up hill to get back with him OP

PatriotCanes · 18/12/2021 14:56

He could have just saved himself some time and handed you all a large red flag.

marriedmadness · 18/12/2021 14:58

He sounds like very hard work, that present was clearly all about him and what he enjoys.

UserBot314 · 18/12/2021 14:59
Elieza · 18/12/2021 14:59

Wonder what he got you for Christmas. A few bananas and grapes, and another hard drive full of war movies of something random.

Your birthdays pressies were not the typical thing you expect. He seems like he’s disorganised and has a one track mind - him and his films.

I think dump and move on may be the way to go. Or you’ll have stuff like this happening all the time.

BronwenFrideswide · 18/12/2021 14:59

Then boyfriend pulls out a bag of apples and another bag of tomatoes and a piece of bamboo. He tells us to close our eyes and imagine being somewhere where these things are grown and being in a hotel and looking out of the window and it's raining.

I thought this was going to lead to a surprise holiday in said place not a hard drive of films. Are the films all related to this?

It's just all too weird performance art attention seeking.

Bin him and the hard drive, life's too short for this kind of crap.

3scape · 18/12/2021 15:01

So a movie equivalent of mix tapes? Or is this some clue where he's taking you (all) away (the fruit thing)?